UK

It was another quiet year for issuance on the London Stock Exchange’s Order Book for Retail Bonds, while unfortunate bondholders of oil and gas developer Enquest, which listed its issues on ORB, had to deal with a restructuring. But investors on the platform have stood firm during the tough times, and are still ready to take down new issues.

Shares in Greencore, the Anglo-Irish sandwich and convenience food producer, closed 3% higher on Wednesday after it completed its £439m rights issue to finance its acquisition of Peacock Foods, a US competitor.

Shares in Life Healthcare, one of South Africa’s leading private hospital operators, rose 1.5% on Tuesday after it said it would raise R10.7bn ($756m) in a rights issue to reduce its leverage after buying Alliance Medical Group, the UK provider of diagnostic imaging services.

Lloyds’ purchase of Bank of America’s credit card business MBNA will hit its common equity tier one ratio, but analysts believe the 80bp decline in will be "easily manageable".

The head of private placements at M&G Investments has resigned and is expected to take up a new job in the New Year.

ICE Benchmark Administration, a unit of Intercontinental Exchange, is to assume the secretarial role on the credit derivatives determinations committees previously held by the International Swaps and Derivatives Association.

Lloyds is the major bank with most to lose from the ‘Basel IV’ rules, according to bank analysts from Credit Suisse, with a leap in risk-weighted assets of up to 21% driven almost entirely by operational risk.

The European Commission will focus on post trade and clearing in its review of the proposed merger between London Stock Exchange and Deutsche Börse, having narrowed its list of concerns from September. But the race is on for the exchanges to address these concerns, with less than three months until a pivotal deadline.

Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan are joint lead arrangers and bookrunners for a bridge loan of up to £12.2bn ($15.18bn) which 21st Century Fox will use to buy the remaining shares in Sky it does not own.

Lazard announced on Thursday that it has hired Will Lawes as a managing director in financial advisory, joining in January.

NMC Health, the London-listed company that claims to be the leading private sector healthcare operator in the United Arab Emirates, raised £255.4m on Wednesday in an intraday equity bookbuild.

Bats Europe is to add several benchmark indices spanning French, German, Italian and Swiss markets and expects these to support derivatives products in the future.